


sleep away

by natigail



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: 2009 Era (Phandom), Alternate Universe - Different First Meeting, Awkward Conversations, Comfort, First Kiss, Fluff, Insomnia, Literal Sleeping Together, London Underground, M/M, Magic, Napping, References to Depression, Sharing a Bed, Strangers to Lovers, Trains, kind of Phil believes he has a magic comforting aura Dan doesn't believe in it
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-26
Updated: 2020-01-29
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:28:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 18,794
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22422610
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natigail/pseuds/natigail
Summary: A stranger falls asleep on Phil's shoulder while riding on the Underground. Phil is content to let him rest however long he needs. He doesn't expect the guy - Dan - to wake up and be mad about it.a.k.a. the three times Dan accidentally falls asleep on Phil and the one time he does it on purpose.
Relationships: Dan Howell/Phil Lester
Comments: 55
Kudos: 188





	1. ~ 19.10.09 ~

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by:  
> "It’s happened to me on the Underground before - someone has just fallen asleep on me and I just let them. I was like, they obviously need a rest. I’m a good pillow. Sleep away." - Phil in his live show (19.01.20)

It was an awkward thing.

Phil was sure that most people would have tipped the person away by now. It could have been done pretty easily with a big shoulder shrug or just nudging their head away with a finger to the forehead or temple. Most normal people would probably have done something to prevent this situation.

It was reasonable. It wasn’t exactly socially acceptable to sleep on strangers in the public space. Some might say that it was frowned upon, even if Phil doubted that people went around and actively sought to fall asleep on strangers. Then again, you never knew what people might do.

This kid though.

Well, he wasn’t really a kid, even if he looked younger than Phil. He had very long limbs, long enough to rival Phil’s, which was rare in itself. His brown hair was flat and falling into his eyes in an emo-style fringe that Phil recognised all too easily. He’d seen the swapped version in his mirror for a while. Still, this guy was probably just old enough to be a legal adult. It was a little hard to tell between the dark patches under eyes coupled with the roundness and youthful appearance of his face otherwise.

The person sleeping on Phil’s shoulder looked like he needed a rest. He looked like he hadn’t been resting at all. Maybe he was a fresher, who had moved to London to attend a prestigious university and he had pulled too many all-nighters studying, Phil daydreamed.

The guy shifted a little again, letting even more of his weight fall onto Phil’s shoulder. It should be heavy and uncomfortable but Phil felt content enough. He could bear a little discomfort to be able to grant someone else comfort that they looked like they had been deprived off for way too long.

An older lady walked on to the train after the stop on Baker Street. She smiled in Phil’s direction, with obvious affection in her eyes as she spotted the guy sleeping on his shoulder. She probably thought that they were together, or at the very least friends. It suddenly felt even more intimate.

However, Phil tried not to think of it as such. He was pretty sure he knew why the guy was currently asleep on his shoulder. He had been drawn in like a magnet, not acting entirely on his own volition.

Phil believed that he has just a tiny spark of magic in him.

His mother and aunt had always been a bit psychic and Phil himself had predicted a couple things with accuracy, even if he had also made many premonitions that had never come true. He just reasoned that his strength didn’t lie in his psychic abilities but rather that he had an aura around him that helped comfort other people.

He had started to notice it at a very young age, when classmates would always want to hang out with him or hold his hand or give him a hug. It had continued as he had grown older, and he swore that he could see how tension evaporated whenever he touched one of his friends’ shoulders and gave it a comforting squeeze and encouraging words. They always told him how he had this air about him, like something that just made you feel at ease.

Phil supposed that was what had drawn the sleep deprived potential-student to choose a seat next to Phil despite other seats being free around the train when he’d gotten on.

The guy had also knocked out in about two minutes flat, head tilting backwards at first in an uncomfortable angle before it had dipped in Phil’s direction and then settled in the nook of his shoulder like it belonged there.

It should feel uncomfortable and suffocating for someone you didn’t know to breathe against you like that. Phil had expected that he’d tense up at some point and try to wiggle out from under the guy but whenever he felt the itch, he just looked down at the boy’s sleeping face and noticed the bags under his eyes again.

Phil thought _he_ was prone to get dark circles but he had nothing on this guy. He looked like he had gone days without sleep. Something twisted in Phil’s gut at the estimate in his head.

It also so happened that he got a different itch when he looked at the guy’s face. He wanted to reach out and sweep his fringe back a little, so it wasn’t directly resting against his shut eyelids. They would flutter a little as if he was dreaming.

“Rough night?” a feminine voice asked and Phil snapped his head up from where he’d been staring at the boy.

He felt oddly caught out, even if he hadn’t done anything wrong per say. Well, it was a little creepy to stare at strangers _but_ if said stranger was already sleeping on your shoulder, then wasn’t the staring justified? He tried to reason like that, at least.

It took Phil a little too long to realise that the woman across from him, the old lady who had smiled at them as she walked in, had been the one speaking and that she expected a reply if her gaze was anything to go by.

“Err… yes?” Phil said but he knew it sounded more like a question than an answer. He felt like he was blushing now too, or at the very least blood was starting to rush to his face and colouring his pale complexion slightly pinker.

“It’s good he has you with him, it’s not safe to sleep alone on the Underground,” the old lady said with a hum of considering.

Phil supposed she was right. Everyone was always told to watch out for pickpockets and if you were sleeping and unable to defend yourself, you were too easy a target.

“Yeah, I’m watching out for him,” Phil said and despite the situation, he actually meant that. He wanted to look after this guy, to grant him this moment of much needed rest, even if he had to act like a human pillow. It was the compassionate thing to do.

He considered telling the lady that they didn’t know each other. They were strangers in every sense of the word, even if Phil supposed that you’d get at least a little familiar with someone if they slept on your shoulder for an extended period of time. Though, they couldn’t exactly share things about themselves while one of them were asleep, so the definition probably held up.

However, he knew that confessing would only arise more questions – questions that Phil didn’t know how to answer. If he started talking about how he had an aura that drew people in and that most people seemed to find a comfort in, then he would sound like a lunatic. He had walked around secondary school proclaiming himself a witch for a couple of weeks and learned that it was not something that you should say out loud, even if Phil still partly believed it to be true.

No one had been actively cruel about it but Phil had still heard their whispers of confusion or learned how none of them believed him. Magic wasn’t real, at least if you asked them.

If you asked Phil, you would get a different answer.

The announcement voice came on to tell everyone that Moorgate was the next stop. Phil needed to get off at Moorgate but the boy was still soundly asleep on his shoulder.

Phil knew that other people might also have let a stranger rest their eyes while leaning on them. He believed that people could be compassionate and extend kindness to each other, even going past what was socially expected of them, but he was fairly sure that for most people it would only extend so far. They would wake the person up, or at least tip their weight off in order to be able to stand up and leave. It would be the normal and correct thing to do.

The train stopped on Moorgate station and Phil watched as the doors opened and closed and the train kept on driving. Phil found a quiet comfort in the fact that this was the Circle line and it would eventually get back to his station again. He’d read somewhere that it took just under an hour to go all the way around. He hadn’t ever tried to ride it all the way around but he’d thought about it.

He didn’t have anywhere he strictly needed to be today. He had just been heading home after work had ended early. He had just planned a quiet night in front of the TV with either a video game or an anime while he ate his dinner. It was nothing time sensitive. He could spare an hour of his time for this stranger, even if he knew he had no moral obligation to do so. He could probably justify this as ticking something off his bucket list, even if this particular thing hadn’t been on it before he had landed in this situation. Things were always susceptible to change anyway.

Phil ended up riding the Circle line for nearly three full loops before the stranger on his shoulder slowly awoke.

It started with small jerks and suddenly the guy’s eyes snapped open. It looked almost like his brain was buffering and Phil was a little mesmerised by the adorableness of it. Until their eyes connected and Phil instead worried that the stranger’s eyes would roll out of his head.

The guy shot back, wincing as he managed to bang his head against the window in an uncoordinated fashion Phil had only thought he himself was capable of. Maybe they were matched in clumsiness.

While rubbing the back of his head, disbelief and something akin to shame painted on his face, the guy eyed Phil like he was a potential axe murder. Granted, a lot of dubious characters probably rode on the Underground but people rarely looked at Phil that way, in fact most people tended to smile and feel at ease around him very quickly.

“Sorry,” the guy muttered eventually. “I… I didn’t mean to fall asleep on you,” he added sheepishly and now there was a distinct flush to his face.

It helped make the dark circles under his eyes less prominent and it seemed that his cheeks had become a little less sunken in. It suited him very much and Phil felt even better about letting him sleep on his shoulder.

“That’s okay,” Phil said, softly in a way he hadn’t planned. He felt like this was a place for whispers even though it was a relatively loud and bustling train. “I’m Phil, by the way.”

He figured it was only polite to introduce himself after the stranger had slept on him for over two hours.

“Dan,” came a response that seemed to be more autopilot than anything else. Dan frowned a little after his name had come out of his mouth and he pulled his bottom lip between his teeth, worrying at it for a beat before letting it fall free.

“It’s nice to meet you, Dan,” Phil said politely and he tried to focus his energy, his calming aura, and let it sink into Dan despite the fact that they weren’t touching anymore.

“You too,” Dan said, “I guess.”

Then he looked up at the next station and frowned a little again. Phil wanted to reach out and ease that line out of his brow because he had a feeling it took up residence on Dan’s face way too often.

“Wait, how long was I asleep?” he asked and looked at Phil.

There was something frantic and worried in his eyes now and Phil felt a little like he was looking into the eyes of someone slowly but surely tilting towards increased anxiety. He had seen it in the mirror often enough to know the tell-tale signs.

“A couple of hours?” Phil said, quietly almost hoping that Dan would not hear him.

He did if the way his jaw legitimately dropped a little was any indication. The buffering looked like it was back over his eyes again.

“I… what? Hours? What are you on about?” he asked, voice growing higher and more hysterical and a couple of the other people on the train looked their way with slightly alarmed but also interested eyes.

Dan pulled out his phone from his pocket and started at his home screen with utter disbelief. Sitting next to each other Phil couldn’t help that his eyes fell on the screen too for a beat before he averted his eyes. He hadn’t even paid attention to what the clock had said, instead he had just noticed what looked like a very fluffy and adorable cream coloured dog. Maybe it was Dan’s dog?

Phil wanted to ask about the dog, he was already opening his mouth but Dan chose that moment to shoot up from his seat and he was back to glaring at Phil like he was a serial killer.

“We’ve been on the train for two and a half hours! That’s… I can’t even deal with this! Wait, that means I’ve slept for more than two hours – that’s incredibly actually because I can barely get one uninterrupted hour of sleep – but that’s not the point! Don’t you have a stop to get off on? Are you just a weirdo who rides on trains for fun? It that like a thing? A train kink or something? Why the fuck didn’t you wake me!?”

The words tumbled from Dan’s lips alike a tsunami and Phil certainly felt like the water washed over him too quickly for him to run away. The breath felt knocked from his lungs and he didn’t even know how to deal with all of this.

Worse, he could now feel all the stares of the people around him and he felt his anxiety flare up. Now he was the one who should be worried about being pushed to a panic attack. He didn’t do well with confrontations – they hardly ever happened to him! – and now one was happening in public with too many eyes on him.

Dan’s word stung too but in particular the malicious way he had said weirdo. Phil had heard it spoke in that tone before and it dug at an old wound.

Dan was staring at him, clearly expecting an answer but he had hurled so many questions at Phil that he didn’t even know where to start. His mouth decided to run off with him before his brain could kick in.

“I… I didn’t want to wake you,” he whispered. “You looked like you needed a rest.”

Dan’s face twisted into something ugly and confused and his chest was heaving and his breaths were coming out heavily.

“That’s really fucking creepy! We don’t know each other. Any decent human should just have knocked me off instead of subjecting me to whatever this is! I don’t-”

He only cut himself off because he realised that the train was coming to a stop. He moved towards the door but he didn’t walk out before casting one final look in where Phil was still sitting in his seat, stiff and mortified.

“ _Dan_ ,” Phil called out, softly in a pleading tone.

“Fuck off, weirdo.”

With those words Dan walked off the train and disappeared into the masses of people. Phil stayed frozen and horrified in his seat for the next couple of stations, missing Moorgate once more, but once he realised, he had enough sense to get off at the next station and take the opposite train to get back instead of going the whole way around again.

Clearly, it hadn’t done him any favours.

Phil tried to pretend that he didn’t feel shocked and hurt by a stranger’s words. Dan didn’t know Phil; he hadn’t even stopped to hear him out or give him a space to explain himself. Phil knew his intention had been pure and he could never have expected someone would take it this way. It had not been his intention but he still felt sad that he had evidently massively moved past Dan’s boundaries – even if he had no way of knowing that beforehand.

Phil slept fitfully that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Reblog on tumblr](https://secretlywritingstories.tumblr.com/post/190480351860/sleep-away-phan-au)
> 
> Ahh! I'm excited to share this fic with you guys. Thank you to the people who showed interest when I asked if you'd like to see me write something inspired by that live show quote from last week. This work will be four chapters in total, most of which is already written, so the plan is to do daily uploads until it's finish.
> 
> Do excuse Dan in this first chapter, he's been dealing with a lot and he doesn't handle situations well when he's groggy by sleep and being shown exceptional kindness and compassion from a stranger. It will get better in the next chapter, I promise. They actually have an open conversation and it's so soft, you guys.
> 
> Expect an update around 8 PM CET tomorrow!


	2. ~ 31.10.09 ~

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phil can't quite believe his luck - or misfortune - to run into Dan on the train again. He braces himself for more awkwardness, maybe a bit of rage again but instead Dan is apologising. Phil is pleasantly surprised.

The Halloween party had been fun, even if some people had made fun of Phil for going with a classic but very low maintenance costume. The yellow cat ears with plaid pattern had been something he’d bought a while ago on a whim and it had been pretty easy to locate some sharpie to draw a nose and whiskers on his face. He didn’t care that his whiskers were definitely wonky. It was a look, if you asked him.

He had not been the only one in a low maintenance costume thankfully and as the night had progressed, it hadn’t mattered. The party had been hosted by a couple of Phil’s university friends and while he had definitely had a good time, he had also realise that starting the night early meant that he needed to call it quits relatively early too, if you could call midnight early.

Younger Phil would have scoffed at that and said it was just the beginning of the night. Twenty-two-year-old Phil already felt aged beyond his years and the existence of a fulltime job come Monday morning meant that he couldn’t let too loose. He had made it through university while mastering the line between tipsy but avoiding a horrendous hangover in the morning and he was going to stick to the safe side of that line now.

That’s how he found himself stepping onto the Circle Line train into a way to crowded cabin. Everyone looked like they were heading out instead of going home and Phil marvelled a little at all of the amazing costumes he walked past while searching for a seat. He could technically stand but he’d busted a couple of moves on the dance floor – yes, he insisted on calling it that despite his friends’ teasing – and he could feel the slight ache in his legs.

He nearly made it worse when he froze in his steps and nearly knocked his shins into the edge of the row of seats.

This had to be a trick of some kind or the universe had a twisted sense of humour.

The only seat free in this whole part of the train had to be next to Phil’s old stranger on the train. The guy who had fallen asleep on him and then shouted at him in front of a lot of people. He was engrossed in his phone, thumbs typing across the screen.

Phil knew he couldn’t sit down there and he was trying to make a sneaky retreat when he did actually bump into the edge of the seats and let out a soft whimper.

It was enough of a noise to cause Dan to look up and Phil felt a sense of déjà vu with how Dan’s eyes got larger and seemed ready to pop out of his head again. Then he squinted at Phil’s face and for a moment, Phil wondered if his costume was enough of a disguise that he couldn’t be recognised.

“Phil?” Dan asked, a little hesitation in his voice. He sounded angry and on guard and Phil hated that.

And well, Phil shouldn’t have expected a few smudged lines and some cat ears would be enough to disguise him.

“Yeah,” he confirmed and then held up his hands in surrender. “I swear I didn’t know you were going to be here. I’m sorry.”

With that he turned around and clutched onto one of the nearby poles to hold on, so he didn’t stumble as the train moved again. He could feel people looking in his direction but he tried to ignore it.

He tried to go to a happy place in his mind instead.

A place where he wasn’t forced to interact with someone that he’d shared a very awkward encounter and one where he wasn’t surrounded by so many people. He wanted to be home in his flat, his safe space, and under his duvet, instead of on this bumbling train.

It was a shame that he had quite a lot of stations to go. He could get off next time and take the following train but that would mean waiting and Phil didn’t want that either.

Someone cleared their throat behind him but Phil hardly noticed it. It was only when the noise repeated three more times that he subtly looked over his shoulder to see Dan waving a hand at him.

Phil pointed at himself, resisting the urge to look around to see if Dan could mean anyone else. This whole situation seemed very unlikely but Phil wasn’t sure why Dan was willingly seeking him out this time. Still, it seemed his body knew what to do better than himself because his feet were moving forward in direction of Dan and he found himself sat, carefully and on the edge of the seat but still, next to Dan once more.

“Look…” Dan said and there was an intensity in Dan’s eyes that Phil hadn’t been expecting.

He had seen them sleepy and panicked but this was different. It was almost as if they shone with determination and Phil couldn’t quite understand what was happening.

Maybe he had accidentally walked through a portal to an alternate dimension or something.

He’d tried to make that happen a lot when he was a child. A few times he had thought that he’d actually managed to do it but it always turned out that his mother had just been playing along and indulging him. Still, Phil didn’t rule out the possibility entirely.

You could never know.

“What?” Phil asked, confusion seeped into the core of the word.

“I acted like an asshole, okay?” Dan said and it was not what Phil had expected out of his mouth. “I was a jerk and I said a lot of mean things but I was just very disoriented and confused. I… thinking back on your reaction, it didn’t seem like you tried to be creepy. You seemed to be polite and kind, I guess. But just… no one is that kind? Kind to an almost weird degree?”

Phil didn’t hide the slight flinch at the word but he plastered on a bright smile in the hopes of hiding it. It usually worked. When Phil smiled, people tended to smile back him, even when he wasn’t being entirely sincere.

Only, Dan was frowning again. It seemed to be almost his default expression.

“Shit, no, I don’t mean in a bad way. It’s… a good thing, I think, even if it’s very… unusual. People don’t do that. Most people wouldn’t let a stranger sleep on their shoulder in the first place, let alone for hours when you’re supposed to be somewhere else and I just-“

“Can I say something?” Phil interrupted, lifting up his hand a little to attract Dan’s attention again because his eyes glassed over slightly when he was rambling and he was almost more looking out into the room than at anything in particular.

“Sure,” Dan said, and he sounded worried, and he brought his hands together to absentmindedly crack his knuckles. It didn’t even seem like he was aware that he was doing it. It was just something idle for his hands to do while his brain was running amok.

“I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable. It really wasn’t my intention. You just… you looked like you needed a rest and I just wanted to help, if I could even a little. I meant to wake you up when we got to my stop but…”

“But?” Dan pressed and now his eyes were brighter again, focused and searching for answers. There was something mesmerising about watching how he seemed to shift in and out of focus, in and out of his own head and his thoughts, and the way it could be seen in his eyes. They were the windows to the soul after all. Phil had always believed that.

“It’s going to sound insane,” Phil prefaced it with.

He had learned to do that now whenever he told people about his abilities. It helped mollify the reactions just a bit, even if pity was the most common reaction. Most people thought it had been cute when he’d been a child but it wasn’t socially appropriate for a grown ass adult to think he had magical abilities, even if Phil would be quick to assure everyone that he didn’t mean in terms of conjuring lighting or setting things on fire or making things fly or teleporting from one place to another.

His magic was more subtle. It wasn’t a grand thing. It was just a sense of comfort that he was able to share with people. He refused to think of it as anything else than magic.

He was sure that most humans had a little magic in them. Some people seemed to always pick up the exact number of things they needed from a pile. Some people could hit a ball into the target from ridiculous angles. Some people made you happy or angry or sad just by being near them.

Phil knew he brought comfort and smiles to people. It was a little bit of magic no matter what anyone else said.

“I’m magic,” Phil said, deciding not to tiptoe around the topic. “My presence is comforting.”

And maybe he had wanted to see that look of disbelief on Dan’s face that he knew had been coming. It didn’t disappoint. It was mesmerising and Phil could practically feel the doubt radiate off him. He had half-expected Dan to get up and just walk away from the seat.

Phil would have guessed that Dan was cynical just by looking at him – Phil was an excellent judge of character – but he also knew that he’d had a good feeling about Dan the moment they had met on the other train. Even if things hadn’t progressed as Phil had expected, he could still sense that feeling deep in his gut. It had twisted and turned a little when Dan had called Phil a weirdo and it was tense now as Dan evaluated him once more, but it still didn’t go away.

“You’re… magic?” Dan asked, eyebrows raised under his brown fringe. “Like what, a magical cat?”

At the question he tipped his head in Phil’s direction and Phil raised his hand to trace over the cat hears on his head.

“No,” Phil said and his voice had taken on a soft quality once more. It was his soothing voice and it tended to come out whenever it wanted. Phil didn’t feel like he had a lot of control over it. “By the way, what are you dressed as?”

It was a cheap shot at redirecting the conversation but Phil wasn’t sure if he was ready for Dan to logically pull him apart, explaining why there couldn’t be such a thing as magic. Phil had heard it all before.

“Can’t you tell?” Dan asked, a hint of a smile on his lips.

Phil took a moment to survey Dan, now that he had been given permission. His hair was curlier today, and it looked soft. He had dark marks on his cheeks but they were smudged beyond recognition. He was wearing a fluffy brown hoodie with a black hood but that didn’t seem to help Phil either.

“No idea,” he said honestly.

“Really? I thought it was pretty obvious. I’m a bear,” he said, and his smile turned shyer.

“You are way too thin and lanky to be a bear. Not burly enough,” Phil blurted out before he smacked a hand over his mouth.

He hadn’t meant to say that, now that the implication settled with him. It was a pretty common gay slang. Phil had come out in university and he didn’t mind that people knew he was gay but he didn’t exactly go around and indirectly hint at it in public where anyone might overhear. It wasn’t safe. People still got beaten up for being gay, even in London.

But likely Dan wouldn’t get the reference and he’s just thought about the animal and-

“Hey, don’t stereotype people. Besides, labels suck,” Dan said and he voice sounded like it was shaking slightly.

Phil could tell how his eyes shifted, nervously, like he was evaluating Phil’s reaction to his words.

His words of acknowledgement. Judging by the response, Dan might also be queer in one way or another. Phil didn’t want to analyse why his heart soared at that thought anyway. He knew he had a good feeling about Dan.

“You’re right, labels should only be used by people if they want them. They can be a source of comfort for some but feel restricting to others. And… I was just joking around.”

“Oh,” Dan said and there was something small and almost aching in just that one sound.

Phil wanted to make it better and his mouth moved without permission yet again.

“I mean, I’m gay, but you know,” he said in a hushed voice for only Dan to hear.

Oh.

He’s just come out to a stranger on the train. That had not been the plan when he’d left his flat this morning. Frankly, he had been sure that he’d never see Dan again. London was full of people and while you might run into someone with similar routines again, it was more likely that you wouldn’t see them, even if you were in the close vicinity.

The announcement voice managed to reach Phil’s ears and it was calling for Moorgate. He should be getting up and getting off the train.

“That’s my stop,” he said. “I…”

“Stay,” Dan said, surprising Phil who had been starting to get out if his seat.

“What?” he asked, but it sounded more like a bizarre squeak.

Dan looked down and his hands that he was wringing in his lap. “Like for another loop around. It’s… I… I can’t…”

Dan couldn’t find the words but that made Phil all too aware of what he was trying to say, namely that he didn’t know how to put anything into words but he wasn’t ready to break this off – whatever this was.

Phil was probably only able to tell because he felt the same way. He felt drawn to Dan in a way that people always described that they were drawn to Phil. Maybe Dan had some magical comfort ability in him too.

As Phil pondered what to do, the train came to a halt and the doors opened. He was still hovering awkwardly in the air but then with a small sigh he sat down. One more loop around the city wouldn’t do any harm, even if he was still a little tipsy and growing more tired by the second.

Silence settled between them as the doors closed and the train drove on.

Phil glanced over at Dan, noticing again how he was wringing his hands together. It was more instinct than anything else that made him reach out and carefully close his hand over Dan’s knuckles.

Dan flinched a little in his seat, even as his hands stilled under Phil’s touch. Dan’s hands felt warm and soft to the touch despite how he was clenching them now. Phil tried not to imagine what it would be like to slide his hand into one of Dan’s properly to hold it, palm against palm.

Too many people scoffed at handholding but Phil loved it so much. He would almost always lock hands with his friends when he was walking around and it brought him a sense of calm to know that he was tethered to someone else and that he wasn’t just floating through the air.

Phil didn’t want to but he still pulled his hand back into his own lap. Dan was just staring down at his hands but at least they stayed still.

The frown was back on his brow now but it wasn’t as deep as usual. He didn’t look angry, like before, he looked baffled and slightly confused. However, Phil took comfort in the fact that there were no hard lines on his face anymore. It was all just soft creases now. It was better than before.

“Sorry,” Phil felt the need to say, breaking the silence that lingered between them.

“No, it’s… I don’t know. It’s fine. Really.”

“It isn’t if I pushed past your personal boundaries, it wasn’t my intention. I just looked like you were straining your hands too much,” Phil explained.

Dan let out a snort that Phil couldn’t help but find endearing.

“I’m the one who fell asleep on you last time,” Dan said and yawned as if just the talk of sleep made him feel a little sleepier. “So, if anything I’m the one who should be sorry. It’s not okay to just randomly fall asleep on strangers, even if it wasn’t my intention.”

“You must have really needed to fall into such a deep sleep so quickly,” Phil remarked and there was a hint of a question in his voice but it was subtle enough that Dan could ignore it if he wanted.

With the way that Dan drew in a sharp breath, Phil thought he might get an answer but it seemed Dan psyched himself out of it before he gathered the courage to speak. It was okay. Phil wasn’t entitled to know anything about his personal life, and he had a feeling that getting rest, or rather the lack of rest, might be a sore subject.

Some people were more prone to under-eyes circles than others but Dan’s were still deep and the way he held his whole body spoke of a sleeplessness. Phil had seen it too often in students around campus when exams had been coming up. They would skip out on sleep entirely or just take naps to get by. They were a bit like walking zombies with their pale complexion and their glossed over eyes.

They looked a lot like Dan.

There was something going on. Phil could tell, but only really in that vague way that you’d feel whenever you saw someone on the street or the train and feel that _vibe_. He couldn’t explain it and couldn’t put it into words but Dan was one of those people that made his mind spin out and make theories about him. Some of them might be right but he also knew from experience that some of them would be wrong.

Either way, it wasn’t Phil’s place to pry so instead he shifted gears into more safe territory. Or he was about to, when Dan spoke up.

“Is that… do you actually, like really and legitimately believe about that… magic shit that you were sprouting before? You weren’t just trying to make me laugh? Or playing some elaborate roleplay that’s going over my head?”

Phil had not expected that to be where Dan’s thoughts were at but he didn’t mind. He liked talking about himself, at least that aspect of himself, when he could because most people really didn’t want to talk about it. It felt nice to let stuff out now and again.

“I mean, magic is what we want it to be, right? Who’s to say what is or isn’t magic?” Phil philosophised.

“Science,” Dan said, voice clear and steady, even as he raised a questioning eyebrow at Phil and had a small smile tugging at his lips.

“Well, science is about discovery, right? I’d agree that some things that were considered magical in the past can be explained by modern day science. But even some things we can do because of science is like magic. Like, flying in the air? Pretty magical, even if it can be explained by engineering. But what about the stuff that’s less about facts and more about feeling. Relations between humans. Can you quantify and classify that? Labels won’t fit,” Phil said, referencing their previous conversation in a way he hoped was okay.

Dan was watching him closely and Phil braced himself for the counterattack. Most people who initially sounded like Dan were so set in their convictions that they’d only really let Phil say his piece and then they’d go on to pick everything apart with their so-called logic.

Instead, Dan just hummed a little and slouched down in his seat.

“I’m a cynic,” Dan said, humming under his breath in consideration, “and I don’t believe in magic like that. I don’t even believe in humanity most of the time. I don’t know why there would be anything magical about us.”

“But that’s not true!” Phil said passionately. “I can think of a dozen of examples of humans having that little spark of magic just off the top of my head.”

“Oh?” Dan asked and it sounded like a challenge, but a friendly one.

“Yes,” Phil said.

“Go on then.”

And Phil did. He told Dan about his friend that could always hit a crumbled ball of paper into the bin no matter how many obstacles were in the way or if he was across the room. He told Dan about another friend of his that had a tendency to make everyone let out pent up worry in from of crying whenever they talked her for more than ten minutes. He told Dan about the stranger he’d passed on the street who had walked along with an energetic bounce and how the mere brush of their shoulders as they passed each other had made Phil feel giddy. He told Dan about an old classmate who could draw a perfect circle without any tools, again and again and again, without fail.

The stories fell from Phil’s lips with ease and he could tell that Dan wasn’t being entirely convinced by the small interjections and justifications he made, such as luck, practice, or humans naturally mimicking each other. However, he kept listening and he didn’t belittle Phil’s stories and even the interjections were said with a soft and almost fond tone.

Phil was in the middle of a story about his old professor who could always tell who weren’t getting the material just by glancing over the whole auditorium, when he noticed that Dan had fallen asleep. His head had lulled back against the window, and his mouth had fallen slightly open.

That ever-present guardedness on his face vanished the moment he fell asleep. His facial muscles let go of their tension and he looked younger and less troubled. It was so horribly cliché but Phil couldn’t help but notice it.

He’d seen a lot of people sleep, and there was something very vulnerable about sleeping close to another person. Phil knew he brought it on, and he regularly encouraged his friends to take naps with him to get their energy recharged, but mostly he knew the people sleeping near him pretty well beforehand.

He didn’t know Dan well. He only knew the small snippets that he could pick up on because Dan was not inclined to talk about himself in any way. At least he’d been able to confirm that he was eighteen.

A quick glance at the train schedule overhead confirmed that it was just twenty minutes until Phil’s stop would come up for the second time. Phil justified that he could let Dan sleep until then. He’d not make the mistake of staying on even longer than he already had.

Besides, it was way past midnight by now, and Phil yearned for a soft place to sleep for himself.

He wanted the same for Dan. He’d get a kink in his neck if he slept like that for too long but a little while should be okay, though it didn’t exactly look that comfortable.

It was almost as if Dan heard him despite being asleep, because the next moment he was shifting a little but instead of waking up, he just tilted to the side and into Phil, until his head was on Phil’s shoulder. Again.

Phil sat tense under the contact and wondered what an appropriate response would be here. Dan had been upset last time this had happened and it was the last thing that he wanted to reoccur. Phil meant to wake him up, to ensure that they wouldn’t have to go through that awkward situation again, but when he looked down at Dan, he just couldn’t do it.

Dan slept on his shoulder for five stops before Phil shook him gently awake by rustling his shoulder when Moorgate was up next.

Dan let out a noise from within his throat, like a protesting whine, and he moved a little to sink deeper into Phil’s space. Phil felt how Dan’s nose grazed his throat.

“Hey, Dan,” Phil called softly. “You have to wake up now. I have to get off on the next stop.”

“Hmm?” Dan said and then finally opened his eyes. He blinked a couple of times and Phil couldn’t help but notice that the glassed-over effect was gone from his eyes despite the fact that he’d just woken up and he looked otherwise disoriented.

Dan only seemed to notice their close proximity then and Phil had expected him to jerk back like last time but this time he just rolled his eyes and hissed a little before slowly removing himself. Phil was fairly sure he heard a “for fuck’s sake” muttered under Dan’s breath.

“You look like you needed it,” Phil said, in explanation and in defence of himself. “You’ve only been sleeping for twenty minutes this time.”

“You’re too pure for this world, Phil. Why did you just let me sleep on you?” Dan asked. “Again.”

“You just-“

“Stop saying I looked like I needed it. I always need sleep and yet it almost always eludes me. It’s an endless and exhausting chase,” Dan said and then he diverted his eyes and looked shy.

Phil felt like he probably hadn’t meant to admit that out loud. It was the first personal thing he’d shared about himself and right now he looked like he wanted to blend in with the interior of the train and disappear.

Phil wanted to tell him that it would all be okay. He wanted to assure him that things would turn out well. Phil wanted to reach out and pull him into a comforting hug and push all of his energy into Dan’s bones in the hopes it could make him sleepy.

But he couldn’t do any of that. Him and Dan didn’t know each other like that.

It hurt to know that Phil wanted to know him like that but he probably never would.

Meeting a stranger was one thing and it was incredible to have encountered him twice by accident. However, it was not likely to keep happening.

People said that third time was the charm but considering that the two first times had made him have encounters with Dan, Phil was more inclined to believe that the third time would never happen.

Then again, people also said that things came in threes, so maybe it would mean that he’d get lucky once more and run into Dan. It was leaving a lot up to chance and while Phil believed in the universe to a degree, he wasn’t sure if he was willing to leave this entirely up to it.

He couldn’t just walk out of Dan’s life but he knew he had to.

The train was slowing down and, in a moment, it would be at Phil’s station. He didn’t have time to talk more to Dan or explain all of the things inside of his head that he could barely understand at all.

He could only think of one thing to do.

Phil said his phone number out loud.

“What?” Dan asked, looking very confused at having had a string of numbers thrown in his face.

“It’s my number,” Phil said. “If you… I don’t know. I just… if you need someone to talk to or nap with or something. Give me a call. I’ll pick up, I promise.”

The train stopped and Phil got up from his seat. Dan was looking a little frenzied and digging into his pocket for his phone.

“Say it again,” Dan requested, even as Phil was walking towards the doors that swung open.

He said it once more, and he watched as Dan’s fingers flew across the keys.

Phil wasn’t sure if it should mean anything. Dan could be typing anything; it didn’t have to be his number. Maybe he just didn’t dare to go against the weirdo he met on the train and he was just indulging him. Phil couldn’t blame him.

Even if Dan was putting down his number, it was no guarantee that he’d actually call it. It was much more likely that it would just sit on the phone untouched. Why should he reach out to Phil of all people?

Phil wouldn’t let himself get his hopes up. He waved, awkwardly, before he stepped off the train without another word. Saying goodbye would have felt too final and Phil wasn’t ready to let go of the intriguing boy just quite yet. He knew he might not have a choice but the ball was in Dan’s court and all Phil could do was wait.

He just hoped that Dan would be able to get some sleep when he got home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahh! Can you hear me screaming! I love these two boys. Phil is so flipping intrigued by Dan but he's also trying to respect his boundaries. He just wants Dan to feel better and get some sleep. And while Dan might still seem a little cold and closed off, I hope you can pick up that he's actually being quite kind to Phil - in how he listens without judgement, which is rare for anyone to do for Phil. Also, do you think Dan got Phil's number down right? ;)
> 
> I hope you're enjoying this fic so far and please let me know in the comments or on tumblr (inbox is open on @natigail).
> 
> Next update will be tomorrow at 8 PM CET.


	3. ~ 29.11.09 ~

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After nearly a month, Phil is sure that Dan won't call him but then the phone does ring. After hearing the fatigue in Dan's voice, Phil invites him over. It's technically just to hang out and talk but Phil isn't surprised to find out that it ends with Dan sleeping on his shoulder again.

Phil’s phone was ringing.

He hated whenever that happened because he did not do well with talking on the phone. He much preferred to text. Everyone that knew him well knew that about him. As a result, it was pretty much only his mother and telemarketers that called his number. He would always answer for his mother but unknown numbers tended to just get ignored.

If it was important, then they would leave a message or call back again immediately and then he’d make himself pick up just in case some type of emergency was happening. It was a philosophy that Phil had lived by for a long time and it usual worked out fine.

However, since he had given out his number to Dan a month ago, he had made himself answer his phone whenever an unknown call came through. So far it meant that twice he had been stuck on the phone with telemarketers while he tried to politely tell them that he was not interested in switching insurances or mobile packages.

He almost wanted to let this call go to voicemail because it had been nearly a month since he had last seen Dan and he had accepted that they would probably not meet again. It hadn’t been meant to be and Phil had tried to make his peace with that.

But then again, it could be him calling and Phil wasn’t sure if Dan would leave a message. It was nearly 9 PM and it wasn’t likely that any telemarketers would call this late.

Phil hated to leave voice messages on answering machines and he almost always ended up rambling too much and not really getting the important stuff said before he heard a tone that cut him off. If he didn’t pick up, he might lose his chance and he was a big believer in the notion that you should grab any opportunity that came your way, no matter how scary or intimidating it might seem. You never knew what it could lead to.

Phil reached for his phone and swiped across the screen to accept the call just as it rang for what might have been the final time.

“Hello?” he said, voice almost at a whisper for reasons he couldn’t explain. He sounded like an old man who had been pranked one too many times and now feared for the worst whenever the phone rang.

He was just met with silence and for a beat Phil wondered if it was a prank call or maybe just a wrong number situation. It could happen but something in the pit of his stomach made him stay on the line, even as he couldn’t hear whether or not there was someone on the other end.

“Dan?” Phil chanced and at the question he heard a sharp intake of breath.

“Phil?” the voice asked and it definitely sounded like Dan even if there was a strain on the voice that almost sounded like he had just been screaming at a concert for hours. Phil wasn’t sure why he sounded so confused.

“You called me, you know?” he said, a bit of a giggle slipping into his words, “why do you sound like you didn’t know that I would be on the other end?”

“Because I’ve been dialling an array of numbers one or two off from yours on and off. I never actually expected to get a hold of you. Next time you shout your number into the air before storming off dramatically, maybe don’t. Or at least make sure that the other person has written it down correctly.”

Dan sounded a little grumpy but there was also an edge of humour in his voice.

“Well, my apologies. I will keep that in mind next time. Though, I will say that it was just a spur of the moment thing.”

“I could tell,” Dan said with a scoff but his tone wasn’t hard. It was soft and borderline fond.

“I didn’t think you’d actually call me,” Phil confessed. “I was fairly certain that you had labelled me as the train weirdo and then just moved on with your life.”

Dan barked out a short and hard laugh. “I never move on with my life. I just stay stuck in the same loop again and again. Barely conscious.”

The hardness seeped into his voice now made Phil feel sad and cold. He wanted so desperately to wrap him up in a hug. He could almost imagine it, how he’d give Dan a warm squeeze and then just linger in his space until he was all wrapped up in Phil’s comforting aura. He wanted nothing more than to bring him some comfort.

Maybe that was why is mouth ran off with him again.

“Do you want to hang out?”

“What?” Dan asked and he sounded confused. “Now?”

“Yeah,” Phil said and he forced himself not to backpedal. “I’m not doing anything tonight. Unless you called for something specific? Wait, why did you call me today?”

“I… it’s… hmm… I don’t know? It’s just been a thing that I’ve been doing all month. Like I said. Whenever I got sleepy and frustrated, I’d try to call another one of the this could-possibly-be-Phil’s-number on the list I made.”

Phil wasn’t sure if he was meant to be endeared by that but he absolutely was and he let out a little delighted squeal. The fact that Dan sought him out instinctively, without them really knowing each other, once again made Phil feel confident in his magic.

“That’s adorable,” Phil said.

“No, it’s not,” Dan muttered back. “It’s pathetic, is what it is. I shouldn’t have called. I’m sor-”

“Don’t you dare hang up, Dan,” Phil said and rushed to interrupt him because he could hear Dan’s tone was not leading anywhere good. He could not lose contact with him. He felt like Dan would definitely slip through his fingers if he did.

“But I should, Phil. You don’t know me. You know Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh? I have a raincloud over my head too and anyone I get even remotely close to will also be drenched in the rain. _That’s_ just who I am.”

“Well, in that case, I’ll just bring a big umbrella that can keep both of us safe from the rain,” Phil replied.

It made Dan laugh. A genuine and fully belly laugh and by the sound of it, it had taken the young boy off guard.

“Of course, you’d say something like that,” Dan said.

“It’s the truth. If you want to stay in metaphor land.”

“Metaphor land?”

“I said what I said.”

“Yeah, you did,” Dan said and there was that soft tone back in his voice again. Phil liked it much more than the hard and sharp edges that tended to bleed into his words, in particular when he was talking about himself.

Phil had a feeling that Dan might be dealing with mental health implications that Phil wouldn’t be able to grasp or understand but he didn’t need to in order to be helpful. Even if it wouldn’t fix anything, it could help to have a moment of quiet comfort in someone’s embrace.

Phil knew how much it mattered.

“Dan, and remember that you are completely free to turn down this offer and you don’t need to justify anything to me, I will drop it immediately, but… do you want to come over?”

“What? To your place?”

“To my flat, yes.”

“You haven’t even taken me out to dinner yet,” Dan said and his voice was hovering somewhere between shy and cheeky. Phil liked that tone too.

“ _Do_ you want to grab a late dinner? I mean, I already ate but-“

“Phil, I was kidding,” Dan said as he interrupted him. “Well, kind of. I… I think I would like to come over. But you’re sending me a selfie and your address and I am forwarding both to a friend of mine, so you can’t axe murder me.”

“Okay,” Phil said. “I’ll just poison you instead.”

His tone was teasing but he suddenly wondered if he’d gone too far. He didn’t know if Dan wanted to joke about something like that, especially when he had just agreed to come over. Phil held his breath while he waited for Dan’s reaction and he once again cursed that he just spoke without thinking things over first.

“Maybe, I’ll just stab you before you can do it,” Dan replied back, swiftly and with a teasing tone that matched Phil’s.

“We’ll see where the evening goes.”

“Indeed,” Dan said. “Okay, I’m going to hang up now. Selfie and address and then I’ll be over, it shouldn’t be too long if you actually live near Moorgate.”

Phil wasn’t sure why it touched him that Dan remembered what station he had gotten off at but it did.

“Selfie and address coming right up. Any requests for the selfie to make sure it’s one of me?”

“Phil, I’ve seen you in person twice. I know what you look like, dork,” Dan said and the name was said with fondness.

“Oh, yes. I know. Okay. Hanging up now,” Phil said and then clicked to end the call.

He snapped a quick selfie and sent it to Dan along with his address. It was only when Dan sent a thumbs up emoji and Phil finally put his phone down that he considered what he was doing. He didn’t really invite anyone other than friends and family over to his flat.

He’d had guys come over before but not before he’d usually been out with them a couple of times. And that had been very different. It had been dates and there had been an implication to what might happen.

This wasn’t the situation with Dan, even though Phil couldn’t deny that he found him attractive. He was good-looking, pretty even, but more so than that, it was the air around him that seemed to draw Phil right in. He wanted to know more about Dan, stay up all night talking about anything between heaven and earth, and he also wanted to lean over and press his lips to Dan’s chapped ones.

It wasn’t that type of thoughts he should entertain right now. He was fairly sure that Dan still saw him as a weirdo and with the added age difference, even if four years wasn’t that much when you were their respective ages, he didn’t want to get his hopes up in anyway.

Besides, as dodgy and out of the blue as the invitation had sounded, Phil genuinely had no ulterior motives. At most, he just wanted to wrap his arms around Dan in a hug and hopefully make him feel better.

Half an hour later, someone was ringing on his doorbell. Phil had spent the time aimlessly roaming his flat and trying to make it look relatively presentable to guests. It was a bit of a hard sell because Phil had stuff everywhere – he wasn’t even sure how he accumulated so much stuff – and the flat wasn’t big to begin with. It was only a matter of time before he couldn’t cram random objects into the drawers.

Phil took a steadying breath before he pressed the button to open the door. The intercom was broken and he knew he wouldn’t be able to hear anything through it. As such, it was generally a risk to buzz people in but Phil made sure to only do it when he was expecting someone to stop by or he had ordered a delivery.

Despite how long Dan’s legs were – and Phil had got a good look at them on the tube when he had jumped up and then leaned around them unsure like a new-born giraffe – it took him a considerable amount of time to climb to the fourth floor.

When he arrived, his breathing was a little laboured and he was clinging onto the railing with his left hand. He looked like he might just pass out any moment and Phil’s maternal instincts kicked in as he without meaning to ushered Dan into the flat, got him sat down on the big sofa and then quickly filled a glass of water and pressed it into his hand.

Dan looked dazed and a little confused but he had let himself be dragged along easily enough.

“I really would be the easiest murder victim,” Dan huffed out. “Is this the poisonous water?”

“What?! No, of course not!” Phil stared to protest until he remembered their conversation on the phone. Dan raised an eyebrow and then took a careful sip of his glass as the realisation settled. “Oh, right. Sorry, for a moment there I thought you were genuinely concerned I’d poison you. Or hurt you in anyway. I won’t I promise. I can’t even hurt a fly. I mean, I can hurt myself at times and if you’re standing close to me you could be affected to. I tend to trip over things that aren’t even there. I’m not sure if there is such a thing as invisible gnomes that just like to mess with me or if it’s just run of the mill clumsiness but-”

“Easy there,” Dan said and Phil became aware that he had been speaking without really drawing a breath. He took in a big gulp of air. “Also, I might be an easy victim but so are you. How could you just buzz me up without confirming that it was me? That’s very dangerous in London. You never know who might come knocking on your door.”

There was a hint of concern in his voice and Phil smiled, despite it not being entirely appropriate considering Dan’s serious words of warning.

“Well, I knew it would almost certainly be you. Also, the intercom is broken.”

“That’s still no excuse, Phil,” Dan said and there was that softness in his voice, the one that hardly ever shone through his tough shell when he talked but Phil tried to commit the tone to memory since he didn’t know when he’d hear it again.

“I have a natural sense of luck,” Phil said. It was true for most parts, even if his brother had always been the luckier one.

“What? You’re a leprechaun now too?” Dan asked and there was a teasing note in his voice but Phil still felt how his hackles metaphorically rose. 

Teasing could be good-natured but it could also be malicious. Phil didn’t think Dan meant it that way but he wasn’t good enough at reading him like that yet.

“Err…”

“That’s a joke,” Dan stammered out and his face flushed a little. “I didn’t mean it in a bad way, just like kidding, but oh, I’m sorry, it’s not that- I just don’t-”

Phil could deal with flustered and fumbling Dan a whole lot better than a potential bullying Dan. Phil wasn’t sure how he was supposed to kick someone out of his flat but he supposed he would have to figure it out if the need arose.

Thankfully, it didn’t seem to be the case.

“I can take a joke, don’t worry,” Phil said to reassure him. He rocked back a little on his feet and he suddenly felt very tall just standing next to the sofa that Dan was just still sat on where Phil had placed him.

Dan blinked up at him, and Phil took note of his eyes again.

He always seemed to be looking at looking at Dan’s eyes, like he was using them to check in. Right now, they looked focused and they were staring back at Phil’s instead of flickering around the room like they usually did.

It should be awkward to get caught in an accidental staring contest. However, Phil just felt like something settled within him. There was a light buzzing on his skin and a feeling in the deepest pit of his stomach.

Dan held his gaze, with a slightly awkward smile on his lips, but his eyes stayed open and focused. He didn’t break the eye contact and Phil was never someone to step down from something like this first.

He had often been in hugs for minutes on end because he would never initiate the breaking of a hug. He was happy to just stand and stay in the embrace for however long was needed. He had never tried to do it with eye contact but once would have to be the first.

“Are you just going to keep staring at me?” Dan asked, voice pitched lower and deeper than Phil had ever heard it before.

“You’re staring at me too,” Phil countered.

At the reply, Dan’s eyes crinkled up in the most adorable way and Phil had been looking so intensely that he got the full effect and he felt the swoop deep in his stomach. Dan was beautiful when he genuinely smiled. He had the type of smile that someone might spin some lovely poetry over. Phil might be inclined to try himself.

Dan’s smile and the laughter that bubbled up in his throat meant that he looked away and the staring contest was broken.

“You’re weird, Phil,” Dan said with a soft tone, but even so the butterflies that had been summoned to Phil’s stomach seemed to freeze, until Dan continued. “In the best way. You’re just… unapologetically you. You believe in magic auras and you extend extreme kindness to even strangers. You don’t worry about what people think of you.”

Phil frowned a little at that assessment. Was that really how he came off? He wasn’t displeased, he was just surprised because it wasn’t the truth.

He moved towards the sofa carefully, until he sat down next to Dan, with enough space between them to not accidentally touch. Phil’s sofa was huge – it has been one of his criteria when picking it out – because he wanted to be able to take comfortable naps on it and also for people to be able to sleep over on it without issue. It was long enough that Phil could lie down on it, with his long body, and if you weren’t scared to cuddle then two people could lie next to each other just fine.

“I’m not,” Phil admitted in a whisper.

“You’re not what?” Dan asked and now that they were sitting next to each other Phil could get such a better look at his face.

The dark bags under his eyes seemed worse than the other two times that Phil had seen him and that was saying something. Even sitting in the sofa, it was like Dan was swaying a little as if the lightest breeze of wind would tip him over despite his tall statue.

“I’m not someone who doesn’t care what others think of me. I try to be. I have to actively work at it. All the time. I used to be worried about what people thought about me and it held me back a lot. I decided to do my best not to let it bother me but it still does at times. I’m at a point in my life where I don’t let it actively affect me, however, I still have to shut that stupid voice off all the time. If I forget to be vigilant about it, then it sneaks right back in.”

“And yet here you are, baring your soul to a stranger that you just invited into your home,” Dan pointed out.

“Well, that doesn’t mean I don’t care. I choose to be open about it, even knowing it means I’m vulnerable to all type of attacks, especially if I talk about my magical ability. I’ve met a lot of people who don’t believe me, like you.”

Dan tensed and leaned away a little and the frown on his forehead was back, digging deep ridges.

“I never said that I didn’t believe you.”

“You don’t have to. I can sense it. It’s okay. I know it seems… scientifically impossible. And maybe it is. I can’t know but… I just know that I’d rather live in a world where magic is real, even if it’s in the smallest ways, so I am going to continue to see the world that way. You or anyone else can’t change my mind on that.”

Phil said the confession with a little apprehension, subconsciously steadying himself for a counterattack but again Dan was just looking at him. Now it was like it was Dan searching Phil’s eyes.

Phil wasn’t sure what he was hoping to find but he looked back and met Dan’s eyes again. It only took Dan a couple of seconds to break the contact.

“I don’t believe in it,” Dan confirmed. “But I like the idea of it. I like choosing to see the world like that. And… you do seem special. I’m not sure it’s magic or whatever, but you seem like a really good person, Phil. I think it’s more a credit to you than any outside factor.”

Phil was left speechless by that. He was sure he looked like a computer screen buffering if Dan’s shy and embarrassed reaction was anything to go by.

“Dan?” Phil asked softly.

“Yeah?”

“Why did you call me?”

“I was just moving through the list of potential numbers,” Dan replied.

“No, you were trying to get a hold of me for a reason,” Phil pressed. “Please tell me.”

“I don’t want to,” Dan said and buried his face in his hands.

“Please?” Phil asked in his sweetest voice. He was shooting Dan puppy dog eyes too but he couldn’t see that with how he was still hiding in his hands.

“It’s stupid.”

“I bet it’s not.”

“You can’t know that, you spork.”

“Did…? Did you just use spork as an insult?” Phil asked, more baffled than insulted.

“Term of endearment,” Dan muttered into his hands but Phil still caught it. He really wished that Dan would lift his head and talk to him.

“Dan,” Phil said and he risked reaching out and place a hand on Dan’s shoulder. He had been painstakingly watching as Dan’s shoulders had crept up higher and higher and how they had grown tenser and tenser. Just like Phil had expected, the tension melted away under his palm, but he was watching Dan intensely, trying to look for any signs of discomfort or even the most miniscule reaction that indicated that he wanted Phil to stop touching him.

He should probably have asked first but touch was so intuitive to Phil that his hands often moved without his explicit permission. He never did more than a light and friendly touch as those had become so incorporated with how he interacted with people.

Frankly, he thought that people didn’t exchange enough small affectionate touches for such a social species. He’d read up on being touch starved and how it could even be hazardous for you, but obviously people were still entitled to their own personal bubbles.

Despite no sign of discomfort, Phil started to pull his hand away but then Dan leaned into the touch and a sigh came from his lips that seemed to reverberate all through his whole body.

“I called you because of this,” Dan confessed, leaning purposely into Phil’s touch.

“My magic?”

Dan shook his head a little but he closed his eyes too and he seemed more relaxed than before. “I can’t explain it, not with words that make sense but… there _is_ something comforting about you. There shouldn’t be. I don’t know you. Well, I guess I know you a little by now but I still don’t know you well and yet… _you got me to sleep_.”

Dan spoke the last words like a confession and Phil had so many questions about what Dan meant, about what he must be struggling with if he couldn’t sleep and he couldn’t find rest, but it seemed too personal. Phil had a tendency to stick his nose where it didn’t belong but there was a difference in poking your nose carefully into someone’s business with good intentions while doing so with respect and just trampling ahead with full force because you felt entitled to know what was going on.

“Okay?” Phil said, unsure, because he couldn’t say anything else.

Dan’s eyes opened again and they looked a little unfocused now and he looked dazed again, like he might fall asleep sitting up.

“You must think I’m weird,” Dan said.

Phil burst out laughing so loudly that he accidentally startled Dan in his seat. Phil couldn’t help it; it was too comical.

“I don’t think you’re weird,” Phil said once he got the laughter under control. “It would pretty hypocritical of me, don’t you think? I know you don’t believe me about the magic but a lot of my friends tell me that they feel safe around me, like they can let their guard down. I nap with my friends all the time and we both wake up feeling better. Even just sharing a hug or holding hands can feel good and comforting.”

“Isn’t that just a human thing? Like human touch helps ease all sorts of things?”

“I never claimed I wasn’t human,” Phil said.

“Right, just that you have magic,” Dan said but he was smiling widely, grinning even, as if he now found it endearing rather than bizarre. “Maybe I should just accept that it was your magic that drove me back to find you again then.”

Phil’s own smile widened at that statement.

“That or the cosmic powers of the universe,” Phil agreed.

Dan chuckled a little and the disbelief was still clear on his face but his lips were also curling up into a bigger smile. “Of course, you believe in that too. I’m more an it’s all coincidences rather that divine intervention kind of guy.”

“Of course, you are,” Phil said mimicking Dan’s tone as he leaned in to knock their shoulders together.

Phil was trying to let himself relax completely and create a comforting atmosphere for Dan to be in. He had been keeping an eye on his posture since he’d sat down and slowly but surely, he’d slumped more and more down into the sofa. He looked cosy. Phil barely resisted the urge to wrap him up in a fluffy blanket.

“You know, this is a very dodgy way to meet,” Dan said, as he closed his eyes and leaned back a little.

“It isn’t that much stranger than meeting someone online and inviting them over to their place,” Phil argued. “And that’s pretty common.”

“What, like hook-ups? I guess,” Dan agreed. “But that’s… yeah. It’s a little similar, I suppose.”

Phil watched as Dan’s breathing seemed to even out even more and by now, he was almost one with the soft sofa. Phil wouldn’t be surprised if there would be a Dan shaped sofa crease by the time he got up. He looked like he wanted to lie down and just sleep.

He still looked like he needed the rest, so Phil decided to ask, even if he also braced himself against the very likely rejection.

“Hey, you remember what I said when I shouted out my number on the tube?”

“Hmm, what do you mean?”

“I said you could call me if you needed someone to talk to, or if you needed another nap,” Phil softly reminded him.

“Oh, right. Yeah,” Dan said but there was an undertone in his voice that made Phil think that maybe he hadn’t forgotten but simply played dumb.

“It would be okay if you wanted to take a nap, you know,” Phil said. “Here, I mean. I’m fine with that.”

Dan scoffed and when he opened his eyes, he looked a little embarrassed.

“I’m not going to sleep in a stranger’s home, then you’ll really murder me.”

“No murder. Scot’s honour,” Phil said.

Dan eyed him, with an odd glint in his eye, as if he couldn’t quite believe this was happening but he didn’t particularly mind it.

“I’m not sleepy,” Dan said, even if it was an obvious lie. Phil didn’t call him out on it.

“Okay, then how do you feel about cuddling? It’s been a long day and honestly I could use a cuddle.”

Dan’s jaw dropped a little at Phil’s proposition.

“You’d cuddle a stranger?”

“I don’t classify you as a stranger anymore, Danny boy.”

“Please don’t ever call me that again,” Dan said with a bright smile on his face and he reached out to shove Phil’s shoulder.

It wasn’t much, just a light and friendly touch but Phil was pretty sure that it was the first time that Dan had voluntarily touched him.

“Hey, it’s better than spork,” Phil argued.

“Barely.”

“So yes or no to cuddling? We don’t have to obviously but I guess it could be mutually beneficial.”

“Why did you call it that? You’re making it weird.”

“Get used to it,” Phil said. “I make everything weird.”

Phil had a very weird relationship with the word weird. Most times he didn’t like hearing it because it was muttered under someone’s breath in a way that it was meant to alienate him. But other times, he felt like he should reclaim it and just entirely embrace it. Who the hell wanted to be normal anyway?

“I… cuddles sound… yeah….”

It wasn’t a full sentence but it was enough for Phil to get the gist of what he was saying. He scooted back, on the sofa and started to lie down and pulling slightly on the collar of Dan’s shirt to make him follow the movement. Phil watched him intensely to see if at any moment he looked uncomfortable or if he wanted to back out but Dan just looked a little nervous and on edge.

It was to be expected but Phil hoped that Dan would feel better when they were wrapped up in Phil’s comforting aura. It should eventually manage to bleed that tension out of Dan’s body, even if Phil had to admit that Dan seemed to be the most resistant person to it that he’d ever met.

Or maybe it was just that Dan’s brain was trying to actively work against him.

They ended up lying face to face and Phil put a hand on Dan’s waist and snuggled a little closer.

“This still okay?” he asked. “Just tell me if you want me to back off.”

“No, it’s… good,” Dan said and he had closed his eyes again, but he was still tense as hell. Phil let his fingers brush down his side, in what he hoped would be a soothing motion. He felt Dan draw in a sharp breath and he paused his movement but when Dan let go of the breath, he finally seemed to relax a little.

He even shuffled closer and knocked his knee against Phil’s. Phil took the hint and lifted his leg a little so Dan could properly tangle them. There was something oddly intimate about lying like this, cuddled face to face, even if Dan was keeping his eyes purposely shut. Phil could tell that he wasn’t sleeping for real. He could already tell the difference after just having seen him sleep twice.

He looked like he was trying to appear to sleep though and it was very adorable.

“I know you’re not sleeping,” Phil said in a whisper.

Dan didn’t react.

Very carefully, Phil reached out to poke Dan in his cheek and then he watched in fascination as Dan’s mouth turned into a smile, a deep and genuine one, and the skin under Phil’s finger bowed inwards and he was now poking a dimple.

Dan had dimples.

Phil tried to let his brain process this but it was almost too much with how cute Dan looked when he opened his eyes and looked at Phil. They looked aware and sparkling and Phil’s breath caught in his throat.

“How did you know I was faking it?” Dan asked in a whisper.

“It’s easy to tell, you don’t fully relax. There’s an unguardedness when you properly sleep,” Phil said and he worried that he’d said too much. He worried it came off as creepy and invasive but Dan was still looking at him with a smile.

His face was so close. Phil could probably count his eyelashes if he wanted to. He might be compelled to try, even if the notion was ridiculous.

“Hmm.”

“I used to think that I was so sneaky when I pretended to be asleep in the car after a long drive so my father would carry me inside and tug me in bed. I think he always knew but he just indulged me,” Phil said.

“But you won’t indulge me? I see how it is.”

Phil giggled. “I thought you didn’t want to sleep.”

“I always want to sleep and I never want to sleep,” Dan said, and despite the completely contrasting statements, Phil felt a sense of understanding.

“You scared of falling asleep?” he asked in a whisper.

It was a heavy topic and one that Dan had shied away from whenever it had come up. It wasn’t something you’d usually talk about with someone you didn’t know well. It was clearly personal but Phil had always been too curious for his own good and it felt like it had just amplified with Dan.

He wanted to know all the things that went on in Dan’s head, he wanted to learn how he saw the world – even if it was so different from the way Phil viewed it, maybe _because_ it was so different from the way Phil viewed it.

“Not really,” Dan said quietly. “More like I can’t turn off my mind. And… I just don’t want to exist sometimes. Whenever I lie down to sleep, I just… spin into an existential crisis that… it’s bad… I’m immobilised. Sleep won’t come. So… I’m tired all the time and yearn for it but also…”

Dan didn’t continue, he let the sentence hang in the air. Phil didn’t push. He had probably already pushed more than most people.

Dan looked almost scared now, brows pinched together, and his mouth in a tight line.

Phil wasn’t sure what to say to that. He wanted to offer words of comfort but he worried that they would fall flat and be meaningless and Dan had probably heard it before. He wanted to share stories of his own struggles to let Dan know that he wasn’t alone but he didn’t want to make it seem like he was making it about himself. He was at a loss for words.

But he had always been better with actions.

“Can I hug you?”

“We’re lying down,” Dan said in a fragile voice but he moved a little closer to Phil anyway.

“Let’s cuddle then. Properly, I want to wrap my arms and squeeze you tight and hope I can pour comfort into you because I don’t know what to say, I’m sorry, but I really want to help.”

“Please,” Dan whimpered and Phil moved.

It felt right to have Dan pressed up against him, to have Dan pressing his face into Phil’s shoulders, as Phil’s arms went around him and held on as tightly as he dared.

He tried to concentrate, tried to communicate just with his body that it was going to be okay. One hand moved around to secure Dan’s waist and the other crept up to play with the hair at the nape of Dan’s neck. Dan sighed and melted properly into Phil’s embrace.

Phil could almost sense how Dan was growing more and more drowsy in his arms and he didn’t want to interrupt it. He wanted Dan to sleep and rest but he also wanted to respect Dan’s wishes.

“Dan, you’re going to fall asleep,” Phil whispered.

Dan lifted his head, eyes glassed over and unfocused. He blinked a couple of times but it didn’t help clear them up. His face was so close to Phil’s now that he’d lifted his head from Phil’s shoulder.

“You’re too good, Phil. Pure. Comforting,” Dan hummed under his breath, eyes still blinking unfocused. “I like you.”

“Dan,” Phil said, his voice cracking.

“I like you a lot,” he repeated, sounding surer this time. “I… can I kiss you?”

Phil felt like he should say no, even as his eyes darted down to Dan’s lips. Dan seemed almost delirious with sleep and Phil felt like he was taking advantage. It was difficult to turn him down though, because Phil wanted nothing more than to kiss Dan.

He had felt himself fall, slowly and with stumbles, but still as sure as anything else. He wanted to learn Dan’s mind inside out, or as much as he’d allow, and he also wanted to pull Dan close and kiss him breathless. He was interesting, beautiful and kind in a way that was different from Phil’s but important and captivating all the same.

“Dan, you’re too tired,” Phil muttered in a weak defence.

“I’m always tired, Phil,” Dan said and then he looked up to lock their gazes.

The filter cleared from Dan’s eyes with the next blink and he looked aware and present.

“I… I like you too, Dan, I really do, but don’t you think-”

“I’m done thinking. It sucks,” Dan said and started to lean in.

Phil felt like he stopped breathing when he felt Dan’s breath on his lips but even so, Dan didn’t go the rest of the distance. He just hovered there, looking imploringly at Phil but also giving him a chance to reject the kiss.

Phil’s last resolve melted away and he closed the distance.

It was a chaste and soft kiss but it still made a warm feeling spread all through Phil’s body. There was something almost inherently affectionate about it.

It felt right.

None of them pushed to deepen the kiss. Just lips finding each other in soft presses and then readjusting the angle a little. Phil’s hands moved to the small of Dan’s back, tracing circles into his T-shirt while Dan reached up to cup Phil’s jaw and adjust them once more.

Phil had never had a first kiss with someone like this.

When he’d been a teenager having his first ever kiss, it had been a quick and awkward peck and then running away. Now that he had gotten older and mostly kissed people that he’d just been on a couple dates with; it was seen as foreplay and it always turned hungry and exploring.

Phil hadn’t thought much of it, he’d liked it for most parts, but this was something very different.

Something special.

Phil could feel how Dan’s lips shifted against his. It took him a second to recognise it. Dan was smiling. He was kissing Phil and he couldn’t stop smiling. Phil’s stomach did a flip and he felt like someone was squeezing his whole body in the best way possible. He was smiling against Dan’s lips too.

“Thank you,” Dan said as he pulled away but he didn’t go far.

He snuggled into Phil again, resting properly and comfortably against him. He was a little tense, maybe worried that Phil would be the one to push things forward considering how closely they were lying.

Phil could read him loud and clear on this though. A kiss didn’t have to lead to anything else, even if they were also cuddling. Actually, Phil felt like he needed time to process before doing anything else. It was overwhelming enough to have Dan in his arms like this. He was perfectly content with how things had gone.

“You don’t have to thank me for a kiss, you know,” Phil said. “I liked it.”

“Oh,” Dan hummed into Phil’s shoulder. “Well, it wasn’t really for the kiss, specifically. Just… thank you for all of this. I am 90% sure that this is some very elaborate dream that my sleep-deprived mind has conjured up. You don’t seem real.”

“You don’t seem real,” Phil said echoed. “Or well, you didn’t seem real. Here in my arms, you feel pretty real though.”

“I feel like I’m floating. I don’t think I’ve ever felt like I was floating before,” Dan mumbled and his words were slurring together slightly and Phil felt how the body that was now half on top of him was growing heavier.

Dan was falling asleep.

“If you don’t want to sleep you should get up,” Phil whispered.

“I’m not going to fall asleep. I can never fall asleep,” Dan muttered.

Phil bit his tongue not to say that he’d already fallen asleep on Phil not once but twice. It seemed counterproductive and Phil didn’t mind that Dan slept on his shoulder. It was growing late and he was tired too. Dan was an adult and he could make his own decisions.

“I’m okay with you sleeping here,” Phil said softly, as his hand moved to trace up and down Dan’s back.

“Not sleeping,” Dan said, barely audible. “Not…”

He didn’t say anything more and a couple of minutes later, Phil felt how his breathing changed and he fell into a deep sleep. He kept his hand running softly over the T-shirt that covered Dan’s back. He let himself imagine what it might be like for them some day in the future.

They could be cuddled up on a bed, a shared bed, and he could get to feel like this all the time.

Phil really enjoyed napping with his friends and family. He felt content and happy to know that he was helping someone and he felt safe and secure to be sleeping next to someone. But it was like that feeling had amplified tenfold with Dan. Phil’s whole body felt like it was singing because it just felt _so_ right. Dan fit right into his embrace and Phil could feel how the tension and worry was draining out of the both of them.

Over the course of the following hour, Phil tried to stay awake to enjoy this moment with Dan in his arms. He could dream but he couldn’t be sure that it would ever be a reality. Dan could be volatile, especially when he just woke up and he hadn’t promise Phil anything.

The cuddle session and even the kiss didn’t have to mean anything, if Dan didn’t want it to.

Phil really hoped that Dan wanted it to mean something, he thought to himself as he felt sleep embracing him, like a cosy blanket, and pulling him into unconsciousness.

And so, they slept in each other’s arms but Phil woke up the next morning alone with no sign that Dan had ever even been there.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know, I know! That was a very unfair ending. But! It serves a purpose I promise. This fic was always meant to take place over four individual and separate days so as much as I considered a cute morning after type interaction, I just couldn't do it. Or rather Dan couldn't. You'll see why in the next chapter where we'll switch over to his point of view! Anyway, I hope you liked this chapter. Comments are always highly appreciated.
> 
> I haven't written the final chapter but I'm counting on being able to finish it tomorrow and upload it on 8 PM CET as planned. Any words of encouragement is also highly appreciated. Thank you for reading, guys!


	4. ~ 13.12.09 ~

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dan wasn't proud that he'd run away from Phil's arms but he felt that he had things he needed to set in motions before he could let himself properly sink into the comfort of Phil.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Mentions of depression (mild and in relation to getting therapy and meds)

Dan wasn’t proud that he had snuck out.

Most of the time he was ready to blame his impulsive and stupid decisions on the fact that he hardly ever got any sleep. He had read a study once where it stated that lack of proper sleep influenced your impulse control – or at least he thought he did. He was fairly sure that he was also experiences some lapses in memories here and there.

He wasn’t sure if that was the insomnia or the depression or if it was the stupid cocktail that they made together.

Dan couldn’t really use the lack of sleep as an excuse for how he’d fled Phil’s place because he had slept more than normally. He’d arrived at Phil’s around 10 PM and he was fairly sure he had fallen asleep within the first hour.

He had only stirred awake at 7 AM in the morning. That was a full eight hours of sleep. It hadn’t happened to him in months. He wasn’t even sure if his body knew what to do with that kind of sleep.

So, he had panicked.

Not gay panic, well maybe a little bit, because there was something soft and tender about Phil and it had scared Dan. He wasn’t out to people, other than anonymously to some people online, and it felt a bit daunting to just sleep in a man’s embrace. To kiss him, even if it had felt like the best thing ever.

Dan kept replaying the kiss in his mind. It had felt like something had finally settled in his stomach. He felt like he’s seen the world slightly out of focus for a very long time, like everything was a little blurred around the edges and then Phil came into his life and touched him, both physically and metaphorically, in a way that just made everything come into focus.

He felt a little like those visually impaired people who suddenly got a specific type of glasses that meant they could see the world like everyone else took for granted.

It was like Phil had brought colour into Dan’s life.

But Dan knew that was too good to be true. Phil might believe in magic but Dan didn’t and he also knew that it wouldn’t be healthy, for any of them, to put so much dependency on Phil’s admittedly wide shoulders.

Dan needed to work himself out first, at least a bit, before he could let himself be swept up in the wonder that was Phil Lester. He’d seen his name on the nameplate for the flat and since then Phil’s full name had also echoed inside of his head.

Dan ran away and snuck out and he didn’t leave a single trace behind. He had contemplated scrawling down a note or sending Phil a text now that he knew his number but he hadn’t been able to make himself do anything.

First and foremost, he had needed to sort out some of the stuff in his head. He refused to depend on Phil to be able to sleep, even if it was wonderful and almost magical.

He had been avoiding going to his doctor and his old therapist for a long time, even though he had known that things had gotten bad again. It was just so expensive and he had felt like it didn’t pan out, like he should just be able to function without any help.

It was foolish. There was nothing wrong with taking medication or needing therapy.

He went back. He had showed up for his doctor’s walk-in hours and he had been seen almost immediately. Maybe something in his face had tipped off the staff. Dan had been avoiding the check-up appointments they had tried to invite him to for months.

He got another referral to see his old therapist, who magically only had a wait time for two weeks, and he got back on his old depression medication. It should also help with the insomnia, at least a little, but they also made a follow-up agreement for Dan to check back in.

Therapy wasn’t some magical solutions to his problems either but it had felt good to be back in a chair and finally verbalising all of the stuff that had been going on inside of his head that he had just tried to ignore. He got reminded of a couple healthy coping mechanisms and he felt lighter as he walked out of the therapist’s office and headed for the tube.

The first week of being back on meds had been hard for his body to recalibrate but it was getting better now that nearly two weeks had passed. He felt a little more stable and he was usually able to get almost four hours of sleep at night, which was a huge improvement from before. He was still tired and heavy on his feet but things were becoming a bit brighter.

Dan still wasn’t convinced that he wasn’t Eeyore and that it would be a mistake to invite Phil to stand near him, even with the promise of holding an umbrella. He wasn’t sure what he could offer to the relationship.

His therapist’s voice rang through his head that he should try not to talk like that about himself. He tried to listen to it.

Phil had gone out of his way to be nice to Dan and while he might do that to any stranger – Phil seemed like that type of person – Dan also knew that Phil wouldn’t have invited him over if he disliked him. He wouldn’t have snuggled so close or kissed so tenderly.

There was something there.

It terrified and excited Dan in almost equal measure.

He wanted to talk to Phil again, to tell him about the responsible steps that he was taking to actually take better care of himself but he wasn’t sure how to break the silence between them. He had Phil’s number and he knew his address. Dan had every way of contacting him. Phil could call him too but Dan was fairly certain that he would never do that.

All three times they had met, Phil had tried to be respectful of Dan’s boundaries, even though Dan could often see how much Phil almost ached to lean in and close the distance between them or ask a personal question. He had constantly been holding himself back and actively choosing to be respectful.

Phil wasn’t going to call if he wasn’t sure that Dan wanted him to, and Dan had left no indication that he did want that. Even if he couldn’t think of a single thing, he wanted more than that.

But he also wanted Phil to know that Dan didn’t see him as a fix, a place to sleep and take advantage of. He wanted so much more. So much that it scared him.

He walked into the tube station and he was just about to put his headphones in when he heard an overhead announcement.

It was a reminder that the Circle line was now officially expanded with the extension to Hammersmith, which meant it was no longer one big circle. You couldn’t ride it all around the inner city without getting off and changing Edgware Road.

Dan’s head snapped up and he stopped in the middle of the station, abruptly enough that someone nearly walked into him from behind and sent him tumbling forward. He didn’t fall flat on his face but he did stagger a couple of steps and heard someone let out a curse behind him and tell him to watch where he was going.

Dan didn’t care.

The Circle line was no longer a perfect circle like it had been just a couple of months ago when Dan had experienced one of the most bizarre yet wonderful moments in his life. He remembered the panic, shame and bewilderment at realising that he had slept on a stranger’s shoulder for nearly three full loops around on the city. It had seemed so impossible and Dan had snapped and said some things he wasn’t proud of.

He couldn’t help but think what would have happened if him and Phil had met now instead of back in October. Phil would have been forced to wake him earlier, and it would have been less awkward but also less meaningful. If Dan hadn’t been so confused and if he hadn’t snapped, he wouldn’t have felt compelled to apologise to Phil when they saw each other again. They might never have talked. He might never have gotten Phil’s number and finally reached him only to be invited over to Phil’s flat.

None of that might have happened.

It reminded Dan that life was a fragile and unpredictable thing. He didn’t want to believe in fate, or cosmic powers like Phil did, but he couldn’t help but acknowledge that this felt a little like it. Just how it did feel somehow, impossibly, like Phil was a little magical.

Dan had pulled his phone out of his pocket and he was dialling a number he had been staring at a lot over the past two weeks.

“Dan?”

Dan almost let out a whimper at the sound of Phil’s voice. Phil sounded slightly confused but he also sounded familiar, warm and safe.

“Hi Phil,” Dan said and he didn’t care that he sounded almost choked up. He was trying to get better at not just brushing his feelings aside and ignore them until they became repressed and mutated.

“Dan?” Phil said again, more surely this time. “Are you okay? You sound upset. Do you need me to come and get you?”

Phil had only met him three times and yet he sounded fully ready to drop whatever he was doing and come running to Dan’s aid. Dan’s chest felt tight and a warm feeling from deep within his gut spread all through his body, all the way to his fingertips and his toes.

“No, I’m okay,” Dan said and for the first time in a long time he felt like those words might actually be true. He was on his way to being better than okay now.

“Oh, that’s good,” Phil said and he sounded nervous and awkward. “You know, I never talk on the phone with anyone.”

“You don’t? Then why did you tell me to call you? Back on the train?”

A chuckle sounded through the phone and Dan felt so enamoured.

“I don’t know, I just knew that I wanted to see you again and I wasn’t sure if I could trust running into you randomly for a third time,” Phil said and then hesitated a little. “Dan, if I did something that made you uncomfortable while you were at my flat, I’m-”

“You didn’t,” Dan rushed to reassure him. “It had nothing to do with you and everything to do with me.”

“You’re not breaking up with me, are you? The whole ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ thing?” Phil asked and he sounded a little nervous despite trying to make light of the situation.

“Don’t we have to be dating for that to be a thing?” Dan joked.

Dan heard a giggle come through the phone and it seemed to perfectly combine with his own nervous chuckle.

“Yeah, okay, I’ll give you that,” Phil said. “I just… I was worried about you.”

The confession hit Dan square in the chest with an unfamiliar feeling. He wasn’t sure that people ever worried about him. His family might worry a little but for most parts he hadn’t talked to them since he moved to London and announced that he didn’t want to go to university. They didn’t exactly approve of his choice to just try to make it in the big city by playing random gigs and taking shitty service jobs while he tried to find his place in the world.

However, the sincerity was dripping off Phil’s words. He had been genuinely worried. It made Dan feel a little worse for not leaving him any indication that he was okay. Or rather that he now believed that he was going to be okay.

“Where are you right now?” Dan asked.

“Err, I just got home from my job. I’m walking into my flat as we speak,” Phil asked and hesitated for a beat. “Why?”

“Can I come over?” Dan asked and he wasn’t even aware of how he held his breath after the question left his lips.

He tried to brace himself for rejection. Phil had every reason to turn him away considering how he’d behaved last time and now he was just calling out of the blue, again, after they hadn’t seen each other in weeks.

It seemed Dan had underestimated Phil Lester.

“Of course, you can, Dan. You’re always welcome here.”

His words took hold of Dan’s heart and squeezed so tight he was unsure if he was breathing at all.

“Phil, you can’t just say that to people you hardly know,” Dan said and didn’t dwell on how it firmly felt like they had moved away from being strangers to each other. “I could still be a secret cannibal, you know,” he joked.

“I’ll take my chances,” Phil said and Dan could hear the smile in his voice. “You didn’t murder me last time. I think I’ll be safe. Come over, Dan.”

“I’m on my way.”

It took Dan twenty minutes before he was standing in front of Phil’s door for the second time. The first time around, he had been standing and staring at the button to ring Phil’s flat for a solid five minutes. His mind had told him all the reasons that this was a terrible, terrible idea to go into a stranger’s home.

He couldn’t have been more wrong.

Dan pressed the button without any hesitation and just like last time the door was buzzed open without Dan having to prove his identity. He almost leapt up of the stairs, as opposed to how he had staggered sluggishly up them last time.

Everything felt slightly different. Better and brighter and filled with promise.

When Phil opened the door, he was smiling over his whole face and while Dan knew he had been missing Phil for all of the two weeks, he hadn’t fully comprehended how much until he was standing eye to eye with him.

“I’m going to hug you,” Dan said, in word of warning, before he flung himself into Phil’s arms.

Phil’s arms which had opened to catch him like it was the most natural thing. He nuzzled into Phil’s shoulder and squeezed him tightly. Phil had been right. Things felt more real when you had them within your embrace.

Now, Dan still wasn’t sure that he could be completely onboard with the magic thing. It went against everything he’d ever learned about the universe but… he just knew that there was something special about Phil. He _did_ have an air of him and he did make Dan feel comfortable in way that no one else ever had.

Dan didn’t believe in soulmates either, but if he did, he might be inclined to think that Phil would be his. He might be convinced to believe in it purely because of Phil.

Phil held on tightly too, even as he maneuvered them into the flat and let the door fall shut behind them.

“I’m going to drop us on the sofa,” Phil whispered into Dan’s ear and then Dan was falling.

He hardly noticed because he was already busy falling, in a very different way, for the man who clung to him like he would never let go.

It felt easy and comfortable to settle into each other’s bodies and cuddle close. Dan pulled and shifted until he was pressed as tightly against Phil as possible.

“I missed you,” Dan confessed in a whispered, muffled against Phil’s skin. He wasn’t sure if he wanted Phil to hear it or not but he needed to get it out there.

“I missed you too,” Phil said and Dan felt breath on top of his head and he could feel Phil press a kiss into his hairline. His heart soared again.

“I’m sorry I didn’t leave a message when I left last time. I… I have no excuse; it was just a little overwhelming and I… I had things I needed to do,” Dan said.

Phil hummed, clearly to let Dan know that he was still listening but he didn’t pressure him to speak. He didn’t need to. Dan wanted to speak. As much as he had made fun of the whole baring your soul, it felt like the right thing to do.

“I’ve got insomnia and depression,” he confessed in a fragile voice. “I went back into therapy and got back on my meds these past weeks.”

“Oh, Dan,” Phil said and held him even tighter.

Like last time, Phil didn’t say anything but he just showed how much he cared and Dan did feel cared for and he also felt exceptionally comforted.

“It’s okay,” Dan said and squeezed Phil back. “I just realised that I couldn’t ignore it and hope that it got solved by itself. It’s a long process but I have to keep trying, I have to keep working at it. You reminded me of that.”

“It sounds like you did that yourself,” Phil said. “You shouldn’t diminish what you did. It sounds difficult. I’m proud of you.”

Dan wasn’t sure if anyone had ever told him that either. Phil was just out here completely blowing his expectations out of the water in terms of support. It felt right and Dan almost wanted to cry.

“Do you know how you asked me why I called you? And I just said that it was because of _this_ ,” Dan said and held Phil tighter.

“Yeah?”

“It was more complicated than that. Yeah, I was curious why I could fall asleep around you and I was desperate for sleep but more so I was so intrigued by you and how you thought of and saw the world. I admire the way you see things. I like it. I like you. So, I didn’t just reach out because you can make me fall asleep and rest. I did it because… I think I really want you in my life, if you’re okay with that.”

Phil shifted them a little so that they could come face to face and Dan realised that at least a few tears must have leaked out of his eyes as Phil went to wipe them away with his thumbs and cupped his face. He was looking at Dan like he was holding the whole world in his hand and Dan had never felt more seen.

“I’d love nothing more, Dan. I like you so much. You’re special. I felt that the moment we met. I felt it when I let you rest on my shoulder. I’m not sure I would have let anyone else sleep on me around three whole loops on the Circle line. Looking back, it seems a little excessive?” Phil admitted shyly. “I’m glad I did though. I could just tell that I needed to let you into my life. This was something important.”

“That’s cheesy as hell,” Dan said and stuck his tongue out at Phil.

Phil just smiled and shook his head fondly before leaning forward and pressing light kisses to Dan’s cheeks, taking away the traces that his tears had left behind.

“Well, I’m cheesy, and weird,” Phil said. “I believe in magic, and most people look at me with confusion or pity if I behave like myself around them. You’ll have your work cut out for you with me. Just a warning.”

“Right back at you,” Dan said and he was smiling so wide that his mouth almost hurt.

Their breathing seemed to sync up naturally, and it was almost like they were moving like one unit.

Yeah, Dan was potentially ready to entertain some of those ideas about soulmates. He remembered when he’d read about Plato, and the soulmate theory of how the Gods had created humans with four arms, four legs, two heads and two torsos but they had been too powerful and thus split in two destined to roam and look for the rest of themselves. It meant there was someone out there – your literal other half and the cynic in Dan had thought it was utterly ridiculous.

He still couldn’t believe in it wholeheartedly now, but he could definitely entertain the myth when it felt like him and Phil breathed as one and that staying in his embrace felt like coming home.

“You know,” Phil said in a soft tone, “I think you’re the first person who see the world differently from how I do but yet you’ve never tried to force me to see it your way or ridicule how I view it.”

The confession made Dan’s body tense and he wanted to meet everyone that had ever made Phil feel like he was wrong for believing that the world could be a bright and magical place. It was such a harmless thing, and the idea enraptured Dan. Phil should never have been made fun of because of it.

“Point me in their direction and I’ll kick their ass,” Dan said.

Phil laughed deeply, and with how close they were pressed to each other, it went through Dan as well.

“I can handle them. Life is all about finding the good people to hold onto instead,” Phil said and to emphasise he hugged Dan close. Dan hugged Phil right back, because if anyone was a good person around here, it would definitely be Phil.

Dan had never felt so… loved.

It was a big word and it was too early for it but there was no denying that Dan could feel it bloom in his chest. He could fall in love with Phil, he knew that already, and he would if Phil would allow him. He nuzzled closer and he felt the tension bleed out of his muscles again.

He felt content, warm and happy here.

He still had to work hard on his mental health and he was unsure about his path in life but he would reject the idea of having to go through all of it alone. It felt comforting to know that he could seek refuge in Phil’s arms. In exchange, he knew he would do anything to help Phil in any way that he could. He was ready to pave the way for Phil’s to express his opinion and his point of view and make sure that no one ever made him feel bad about it again.

Over the last two weeks, Dan had been catching up more and more on his sleep but he was still sleep-deprived and by now he could recognise that sleep was creeping up on him. Soon, it would pull him under again but this time it wouldn’t be a surprise. He knew it was coming and honestly, he wanted nothing than to let it take him.

Usually, he’d not realise sleep was coming and he’d just pass out and then later wake up unsure what had happened. It had felt like something had just yanked him down into water by his ankles but the second his head was under water, he’d just black out. Now, it felt like water was slowly approaching him, slowly lapping up at his sides and it was warm and safe. He would happily let himself sink into this type of sleep.

“Hey Phil?” Dan asked. “Do you know something?”

“Hmm?”

“The Circle line changed today. They added new stations. It’s no longer a loop. Not like when we met,” Dan said, and his words came out slower and deeper.

“Oh, no, I didn’t know that,” Phil said and hummed. “I’m glad we met on the 19th of October then.”

Phil remembered the date. Of course, Phil remembered the date. Dan felt so incredible warmed, from the inside out.

“I’m really glad I fell asleep on you,” Dan said and he never thought that he’d ever say that sentence but he wasn’t sure if he’d ever said anything with more sincerity.

“Well, I’m a good pillow. Sleep away,” Phil said.

Dan couldn’t agree more and he drifted off to a peaceful sleep with the sense that the future was bright and the sky was clear.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Reblog on tumblr](https://secretlywritingstories.tumblr.com/post/190480351860/sleep-away-phan-au)
> 
> And that's the end of this! Can we all laugh at the fact that I thought this would be about 7k when I first started writing it. Well, if that isn't me in a nutshell. I hope you liked this fic and that all the softness and fluff was still dominant despite tackling a bit of a tricky topic with therapy, medication and depression in this final chapter. Dan obviously wouldn't have needed to go back to therapy or on meds to hang out with Phil again, but meeting Phil just reminded him that he should look after himself instead of just quietly wasting away. They can be really good for each other though, and I hope that came across. 
> 
> Thank you to anyone who's read along and in particular to those who leave comments, I adore you guys.


End file.
